Mediaset drops €50m on pay-TV as subs slow

Italy’s Mediaset expects that the 2011 operating loss at its pay-TV unit, Mediaset Premium, will amount to approximately €50 million and not €30 million as previously estimated.

Speaking at the presentation of the results of the first nine months of 2011, Mediaset CFO Marco Giordano stressed it will be difficult to achieve break-even in 2012 if market conditions remain the same.

The Q3 results show that Italian pay-TV market subscribers net additions decreased by 28 per cent YonY. In Q3 2011, Mediaset Premium captured 68 per cent of market net additions, equal to 71,000 Easypay clients, and now has a 28 per cent share of the Italian pay-TV market (up 7 per cent in 2 years). On September 30th, the number of active cards was 2.9 million, of which two million are Easypay subscribers.